When fracture is due to micro-void coalescence the toughness of ultra high strength steels is determined by the nature of the inclusions in the steel and by the fine-scale microstructure of the steel. It has been previously shown for the steels HY180 (0.1 wt.% carbon) and AF1410 (0.16 wt.% carbon) that one can improve toughness by increasing inclusion spacing through the use of rare-earths and similarly increase toughness by having inclusion types that are resistant to void nucleation though the use of titanium additions.

The purpose of this work has been to determine the extent to which rare-earth additions and titanium additions can be used to control inclusion characteristics and improve the toughness of ultra high strength low alloy steels such as 4340 (0.4 wt.% carbon) and 300M. Because silicon additions on the order of 2 wt.% can be used to increase the strength of 0.4 wt.% carbon low-alloy steels without resorting to increased carbon levels, this work also examined the degree to which silicon content influences the inclusion distributions when rare-earth additions or titanium additions are used to modify inclusion type. Two separate low-alloy systems, 4340 and Base+Ni+Si series alloys were investigated.

Extensive mechanical testing was performed by tensile testing, plane strain fracture toughness tests and Charpy impact toughness tests. True stress-true strain curves were obtained by applying the method of Bridgman. The inclusion analysis of the micrographs obtained using SEM was used to obtain the average inclusion radius, inclusion volume fraction and inclusion spacing. Void nucleation curves were obtained to characterize the strain at which inclusions first nucleate voids. Subsequently the critical interfacial stress at which these inclusions nucleate voids was also obtained. The retained austenite content was measured using X-Ray diffraction while analysis of thin foils and extraction replicas was performed using Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM).

The results of this investigation shows that both rare earth additions and small titanium additions can be used to improve the toughness of low alloy ultra high strength steels both with or without silicon additions by altering different aspects of the inclusions and fine scale microstructure.